Two 12-year-old twins died this Friday when they rushed out of a window into an interior courtyard of a building in the neighborhood of La Ería, in Oviedo, due to circumstances investigated by the National Police.
The events occurred around nine o'clock in the morning in a six-story building in the Asturian capital. The screams of the father, asking for help, alerted to the tragedy. According to sources close to the investigation, although the minors lived on a fourth floor, the window that has been found open and from which it is suspected that they have rushed was on the landing of the sixth floor.
The family, from Russia, has been living in the property for years. The couple has a third son of 10 years, who at the time of the event was already at school. The girls, who a few days ago had celebrated their birthday, studied at the public school of the Ería.
The National Police is investigating the causes of the incident, which could be an accidental death or suicide. Inspector Pedro Aguado ruled out "the intervention of third parties" in the death of the minors and insisted that no hypothesis is ruled out in what he described as a "tragic event." Agents of the Judicial Police and the Scientific Police arrived at the scene of the events and carried out the investigations, after the judicial authority authorized the removal of the bodies.
Workers moved the body of one of the minors, this Friday in Oviedo. ELOY ALONSO (EFE)
The mayor of Oviedo, Alfredo Canteli, traveled to the area early in the morning, accompanied by the Councilor for Security, José Ramón Prado, and announced two days of mourning in the capital of the Principality. In addition, the official opening of the events of the feast of the Ascension has been suspended, in which there will be no music, and all parties have decided to interrupt their campaign events in Oviedo for two days.
An atmosphere of sadness and despair extinguished the bustle at the doors of schools this Friday in Oviedo. The screams, the races, the cars in double row and the mothers and fathers chatting animatedly while waiting for their children gave way to a thick silence that did not need to be explained. When the bell rang at the Ería school, where the deceased sisters studied, the children were embraced by mothers who pressed them to her chest harder than ever. Others cried as they watched them arrive and still others commented on the details. "They were very nice girls," explained to EL PAÍS the mother of a girl who usually sat a few desks away from the twins. "Parents always went to school meetings," he says of a family described by authorities as "perfectly integrated."
Although the police have not officially reported the causes of death, for the moment bullying is ruled out as the motive for a possible suicide. Encarna García, president of the Association Against Bullying, warns that "bullying is silent and not so easy to perceive", while warning about the wave of requests for help for suicide attempts that she attends daily. His association has received more calls this year than ever. "We've received almost 400 calls so far this year. This is a record figure," added Garcia, who insisted that "suicide does not warn." According to Garcia, "something is happening in this society, it is a serious problem that we do not want to see," he says.
The news of the death of the girls ran through the doors of schools, streets and cafeterias of the capital of Asturias on Friday. The Principality lives as a drama that six people have taken their lives in the last month and public policies to address mental health problems have crept into the pre-election political debate between the candidates.
Mothers and children hugged each other outside the center in tears a few hours after the news. A classmate of the twins told EL PAÍS that the girls had canceled last week their end-of-year trip to Madrid scheduled for the end of May.
"I can only show sadness. Right now we do not know more data and we have no official information because the only thing we know for sure is that we left two girls, "said the mayor. For his part, the Councilor for Public Safety Oviedo has pointed out that it is a "very integrated" family.
According to the same councilman, the parents, of whom it is unknown if they were inside the apartment when the girls rushed out of the window, are destroyed and received psychological attention in the portal of the building.
This tragedy occurs three months after a similar event occurred in Sallent (Barcelona), where on February 21 two brothers, also 12 years old, threw themselves into the void from the balcony of their house on the third floor. The Ministry of Education investigates whether there was harassment in the institute. One of the brothers, who was born female, died and his twin was seriously injured.